Welcome to Tatler. This site uses cookies to improve your experience and deliver personalised advertising. You can opt out at any time or find out more by reading our cookie policy.

Emma Freud's gadgets for memory loss

So old you've forgotten your own name? Read on... By Emma Freud

01 Apr 2015

Wednesday 1 April 2015

It's not that I'm getting ancient or anything... 52 is actually well young if you compare it to Mary Berry, who is about 150 and still a goddess. It's just that sometimes a girl has so many important things to think about on a daily basis that items like waking up and finding your car keys get pushed lower down the brain's agenda. In fact, to be honest with you, and I wouldn't want to be anything else at any point, sometimes they drop off the end of the agenda entirely and end up on the floor along with the lap tray and the tartan rug. If you can remember what happened on your last birthday, go and play with your toys. If not, stay tuned.

1) When you forget where you put your keys

Check out this little square tile... Looks a bit like a Scrabble piece but is in fact a tiny device that talks to your phone. So wherever the tile is, you can track it - ie, if you put it on your dog's collar and then mislaid your dog because you were thinking about David Tennant and forgot to be a responsible adult for a moment, you open the app and follow directions that will take you straight to the dog. AND the battery lasts a year, so you don't even need to rush. Also useful to put on handbags, keys, children, bikes and David Tennant.

Advertisement

2) When you forget to wake up

This is my App of the Year - a free alarm clock for your phone. But every time you press 'snooze', you donate 50p to Comic Relief (or one of the listed charities). Genius. So picture this... one weekday night you go out on the razzle, drink too much cava eat too many sweets and wake up in your clothes with dribble on your cheek. You can't remember most of the previous night and daren't even LOOK at your phone to see the insane texts you sent at 2am - let alone the mad emails you knocked out at 3am - and consequently find it impossible to face the day and decide to do the multiple-snooze thing, which means you go back intermittently to the place where your head doesn't hurt. As a result, Comic Relief can buy a bednet for a family at risk of malaria. Boom-shacka-lacka-lacka.

3) When you forget where your sunglasses are

This is the sort of gadget that makes your granny shake her head, suck her teeth and sigh, 'Oh, that's just RIDICULOUS, honestly, the modern world, in my day we had two tin cans and some string and it was marvellous.' Ignore her for a moment and hear me out. These shades are properly good-looking - and solar-powered. Once turned on, when you leave them somewhere, they will alert you to your error through the miracle of Bluetooth. You get a polite little message on your phone when you walk 16 feet away from the glasses, then again at 32 feet, and then again at 50 feet. Alternatively, you could buy a sunglasses strap and tell your granny she's got a point.

Advertisement

4) When you forget where your friends are

I love this app. It's free. The only tricky bit is persuading your friends or family to accept your invitation to be part of it. Try bribery - it's really worth it. Because once they've agreed, it means that you can see exactly where their phone is (ie, where they are) 24 hours a day. You therefore instantly become a cross between Big Brother, a spy and Lynda Snell from The Archers (Queen of Nosey Neighbours). I forced my children to sign up - and can now track them at all times. I can locate where my college daughter ends up late at night and see that my son is in detention at school rather than in the 'café' where he claimed he was having a coffee. It also means you can offer helpful tips to people who really appreciate them. I spotted my eldest son leaving a comedy show in east London the other day and watched him turn the wrong way for the Tube station. I texted him, really helpfully and not remotely weirdly, to say: 'Oi - you've gone the wrong way - you should have gone left at the end of the road, not right.' To which he replied: 'I know. I'm getting a bagel. Fuck off.' It's brilliant.